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Old 02-27-2010, 12:18 PM   #1
Astromancer
 
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Default A Transhuman Thought Experiment

This is composed of a set-up and a question.

Here's the set-up. I got a hold of THAT LAMP, Aladdin's Lamp. Having just read a book on Transhumanism, I decide the millenium shall come today!

However I'm told that doing more than my own people is dangerous, but I ignore that warning!

I transform the United States, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, India, South Korea, Japan, Indonesia, Iceland, Greenland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, the Benelux countries, and Ireland. Then, while transforming the UK, I transform Scotland, Wales, Ulster, Cornwall, and most of Western and Norther England until I run into Margaret Drabble's anti-tech phobias and rabin Anti-Americanism, and the Lamp explodes. Those areas of England where Halloween is the traditional fall holiday are transformed, those areas where Guy Fawks night is the traditional fall holiday remain unchanged.

Those areas and nations transformed have radically advanced technology. Cheap fusion, commonplace robotics, nanotech, and advanced biotech are just the start.

Every human in the transformed areas can alter their own DNA at will and choose how their DNA will express itself. And they have all the advantages that implies.

Every human in the changed areas has nanotech in everycell of their body and a perfect awareness and controll of their bodies and all that that implies.

Every human being in the transformed areas is linked to the networks in multiple ways. They can download vast arrays of information including skills of all kinds. They have functional machine telepathy and can multitask in mindblowing ways.

Any human being in the transformed areas can project the awareness into other things and creatures. Genemodified animals and plants with nanotech back-up and simple mechanical sensors are commonplace. Thus any one can see through the eyes of the neighborhood songbirds or feel/hear through their rosebushes.

Extrabodies are commonplace and cheap. Radical changes of appearence and gender normal and expected.

And that is far from the limit of the transhuman mods.


Now here's the question. How do these changes alter the consciousness of those not living in the transformed areas?

On a former thread, I was accused of a lack of imagination for assuming that areas not directly effected by Fifth Wave tech and ecconomics might remain locked in a past worldview. Here I've transformed the world far more radically than THS does. And I ask how are those not transformed affected.

How does the average Londoner react to a world where London is trivial and Edinburgh, Liverpool, Cardiff, and Dublin, change the world?

What does a French man feel about being left a millenium behind?

How does the Islamic world feel about being left amoung the primitives?

How does the average Mexican deal with the fact that the Transformed USA can't use them?

How does Saudi-Arabia deal with a major loss of Markets?

How does North Korea deal with having the South a thousand times better off in a day?

Please answer.
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Last edited by Astromancer; 02-27-2010 at 12:24 PM.
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Old 02-27-2010, 05:43 PM   #2
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Default Re: A Transhuman Thought Experiment

Sadly, war may become the answer. In situations like this, terrorists tend to thrive.
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Old 02-28-2010, 05:14 AM   #3
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Default Re: A Transhuman Thought Experiment

If I'm saved from being violently body-mind raped/ transmogrified by the Lamp's unholy powers, I move to the Yemen and join the Human Resistance Forces, the brave jihadis who fight to save the world from Inhumanist tyranny. If I'm unfortuante enough to be in the transformation zone, I'll work against the new order in any way I can, trying to help the humans bring it down.

Last edited by combatmedic; 02-28-2010 at 05:17 AM.
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Old 02-28-2010, 09:02 AM   #4
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Default Re: A Transhuman Thought Experiment

Quote:
Originally Posted by Astromancer View Post
Here's the set-up. I got a hold of THAT LAMP, Aladdin's Lamp. Having just read a book on Transhumanism, I decide the millenium shall come today!
Scenarios involving Aladdin's lamp are off-topic for this forum.

Quote:
I transform the United States, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, India, South Korea, Japan, Indonesia, Iceland, Greenland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, the Benelux countries, and Ireland. Then, while transforming the UK, I transform Scotland, Wales, Ulster, Cornwall, and most of Western and Norther England until I run into Margaret Drabble's anti-tech phobias and rabin Anti-Americanism, and the Lamp explodes. Those areas of England where Halloween is the traditional fall holiday are transformed, those areas where Guy Fawks night is the traditional fall holiday remain unchanged.
This is another of these threads, and I have to agree with what tshiggins said that time. This fantasy of yours smacks of a rather unpleasant bigotry.
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Old 02-28-2010, 09:21 AM   #5
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Default Re: A Transhuman Thought Experiment

Quote:
Originally Posted by Brett View Post
This is another of these threads. . . .
That's basically how I reacted to it, too. On one hand, discussions of this kind strike me as Astromancer's particular hobby horse. On the other, I don't feel much inclined to ride it. These premises all seem much too open ended to have interesting answers; their ultimate source is not speculation but wish fulfillment.

Bill Stoddard
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Old 02-28-2010, 10:40 AM   #6
sjard
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Default Re: A Transhuman Thought Experiment

Off Topic for this section. Closed
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